# The Computer Science Club



## Dinru (Mar 30, 2012)

A place for people who are interested in the various facets of Computer Science to come and talk about computers and code and get help with their newest projects or college exams or what have you.

No member list or sign-ups.

So, to start a conversation, since most CS people started with programming, what was your first language? Mine was Visual Basic, but at this point I don't remember any of it 'cause I haven't used it in over two years.


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## bulbasaur (Mar 30, 2012)

TI-Basic
bluh
for actual languages though it'd be C


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## Superbird (Mar 30, 2012)

I'm familiar with Visual Basic, I can do various non-advanced things in TI-basic, and I'm taking CompSci next year to learn things. I'm interested in learning Java and C++, that latter of which I also have a tiny bit of experience in.

So yes, I'd love to join!


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## Butterfree (Mar 30, 2012)

Javascript. My heart has always been in web development.

As a result I'm as a rule partial towards the JS way of doing things - dynamic, weak typing, etc. The worst thing about Javascript is the general terribleness of the DOM and all the stupid, stupid differences in browser implementation, but luckily both of those problems are fixed by jQuery, which is more or less the best thing ever and makes writing Javascript almost 100% non-irritating, so that's awesome. :D

I am similarly aghast by the sheer convolutedness of programming graphical user interfaces in anything that isn't HTML/CSS/Javascript. It mystifies me why anyone ever has put up with Java freaking Swing.


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## CJBlazer (Mar 30, 2012)

I shall join this club. I took two years in Computers so I know basics in Comp. Science.


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## Murkrow (Mar 30, 2012)

I'm studying maths and at the moment programming is the subject I'm enjoying most and am doing best at. A lot of other people seem to find it hard, but I think most of those people didn't take computing in school. Plus I do programming in my spare time sometimes, so there's that too. However I generally don't do it that much because I don't feel like I'm very good.
I know some VB from school, C++ from messing about at home, and I'm using Matlab and R for uni work. I'm thinking of giving Java a go as well.

I remember when I was small I messed around with QBASIC but I couldn't do much at all beyond if statements.


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## Dinru (Mar 31, 2012)

Butterfree said:


> I am similarly aghast by the sheer convolutedness of programming graphical user interfaces in anything that isn't HTML/CSS/Javascript. It mystifies me why anyone ever has put up with Java freaking Swing.


Swing is pretty annoying, but when you're making actual GUIs again after 2 years of console-only programs and no real choice in the matter it's pretty amazing. That being said, if anyone knows of a GUI class set for Java other than Swing I'd love to know.


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## Music Dragon (Mar 31, 2012)

Python here, though I only know very basic stuff, since I'm probably heading into physics instead of computer science anyway. I guess I know a tiny bit of Matlab too; I kind of suck at everything I do in Matlab, but I suspect the problem is more with the mathematics than with the language itself.


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## bulbasaur (Mar 31, 2012)

Music Dragon said:


> Python here, though I only know very basic stuff, since I'm probably heading into physics instead of computer science anyway. I guess I know a tiny bit of Matlab too; I kind of suck at everything I do in Matlab, but I suspect the problem is more with the mathematics than with the language itself.


No the problem is with Matlab itself use Maple instead


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## Music Dragon (Mar 31, 2012)

bulbasaur said:


> No the problem is with Matlab itself use Maple instead


Not my choice, unfortunately.


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## Abwayax (Apr 1, 2012)

First language I dabbled was probably qbasic. First language that I ever actually got into was visual basic. First language that I ever did anything _useful_ with was PHP. Fairly advanced in PHP, Java, JavaScript; intermediate in python. Python is what they should be teaching in schools, not Java. :/

Swing is kind of shit but I'd rather have it over freaking HTML and CSS.

edit: Language-wise, I'd take JavaScript over Java any day. You can run JavaScript inside the JVM with Mozilla Rhino. I just don't think HTML and CSS are suited for the same problem domain that swing and GTK+ are. Either way you shouldn't code a GUI by hand, there's plenty of visual tools for that.


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## 1. Luftballon (Apr 8, 2012)

Butterfree said:


> I am similarly aghast by the sheer convolutedness of programming graphical user interfaces in anything that isn't HTML/CSS/Javascript. It mystifies me why anyone ever has put up with Java freaking Swing.


well, is undiffivult to whip up a gui with code generators. they make unreadable crap but that's why you separate presentation from logic, right?

I think I started with perl and then then picked up ti basic? now I'd do thing mostly in ruby or haskell. I like haskell. strong, static typing, sure, but it mostly gets out of you way unless you screw something up, in which  case it is likely to yell at you when it compiles.

uh I spent a lot of time learning with functional programming in between and now I can't write c or java without hating them. or well actually most languages that don't have a map :: (a -> b) -> [a] -> *.*


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## Butterfree (Apr 8, 2012)

Adrian Malacoda said:


> Swing is kind of shit but I'd rather have it over freaking HTML and CSS.
> 
> edit: Language-wise, I'd take JavaScript over Java any day. You can run JavaScript inside the JVM with Mozilla Rhino. I just don't think HTML and CSS are suited for the same problem domain that swing and GTK+ are. Either way you shouldn't code a GUI by hand, there's plenty of visual tools for that.


I think it's just a matter of where I started, really. I mean, I completely agree that HTML and CSS are horribly limited and annoying in more ways than you could count, but because I started there I got used to the idea of having a dedicated language for semantic structuring and a dedicated language for applying high-level styling rules to sets of elements that can be changed without too much fuss, and perhaps most importantly to being able to write the goddamn code by hand without losing too much of my sanity. The very idea of code that practically _needs_ me to use visual tools to produce it makes the hair rise on the back of my neck.


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## Dinru (Apr 9, 2012)

I could have gotten it for mostly-free if I had realized about one month sooner what I wanted to do with my life. I don't have one but I'm looking into getting one within the next few years.


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## Abwayax (Apr 13, 2012)

Butterfree said:


> I think it's just a matter of where I started, really. I mean, I completely agree that HTML and CSS are horribly limited and annoying in more ways than you could count, but because I started there I got used to the idea of having a dedicated language for semantic structuring and a dedicated language for applying high-level styling rules to sets of elements that can be changed without too much fuss, and perhaps most importantly to being able to write the goddamn code by hand without losing too much of my sanity. The very idea of code that practically _needs_ me to use visual tools to produce it makes the hair rise on the back of my neck.


I completely agree with having a dedicated UI+layout language. It's just that HTML+CSS isn't it, especially for applications. HTML is meant to mark up documents. Something like XUL would work. Someone even tried this with Swing... but for some reason it needs a J2EE webapp container?

CSS is passable for styling, but not for layout.

Or if you feel masochistic you can actually develop a web app with Swing if you so choose.


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## Murkrow (May 8, 2012)

So how to people here find/think of things to do?

I really enjoy programming, in fact one of the courses I'm doing at uni is a programming one and it's the one I enjoy most and and doing best at. I always liked to write things in my spare time but I've always been at a loss for what to actually _do_.
I've done a handful of Project Euler problems but that's got to the point where the ones I haven't done are either much too hard, or don't really feel rewarding.

Does anyone have any ideas? D:


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## Dinru (May 9, 2012)

This forum post that has yet to stop answering that question for me. The rest of the thread is good reading too.


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## Murkrow (May 14, 2012)

Thanks, I'll have a shot at something there once my exams are over. To be honest I have no idea why I asked that question at a time when I knew I wouldn't be able to do anything anyway.


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## Dinru (Jun 3, 2012)

That frustrating moment when you're trying to compile a program and the pictures on your buttons, for no logical reason, won't show up. I swear, the more I learn about computers, the less I know.


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## 1. Luftballon (Jun 3, 2012)

well, if you didn't need the pictures as acrutch, that wouldn't be such a problem! memorie the hotkey! you'll use it lots anyway. or the relevant commands, in any case.


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## Dinru (Jun 4, 2012)

It was an assignment for school and the pictures were a required aspect (which is part of the reason it's so frustrating that they're not appearing.) Plus, there was a feature that relied on the exact width of those buttons. (Which, in hindsight, I probably could have softcoded.)


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## 1. Luftballon (Jun 4, 2012)

... oh, I thought you mean the compile buttons. resources not loading is a thing and kind of annoying, i guess.


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## Abwayax (Jun 4, 2012)

Dinru said:


> It was an assignment for school and the pictures were a required aspect (which is part of the reason it's so frustrating that they're not appearing.) Plus, there was a feature that relied on the exact width of those buttons. (Which, in hindsight, I probably could have softcoded.)


Depending on the language in question, there may or may not be an exception if some file can't be found. I'll infer from you sig that you're talking about Java - please correct me if I'm wrong - and in most cases Java will throw an exception if it can't find a file. Make sure you're not catching and ignoring any exceptions and make sure the path is correct (especially with regards to the file separator character - File.separator - never hardcode this character because that inherently makes your code platform dependent, and also look at character case, because some filesystems have case-insensitive names and others do not)


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## Dinru (Jun 5, 2012)

I knew all of that already, but thank you. It wasn't throwing exceptions, but I figured out how to softcode the location of the image. It loaded fine after that. (I got 129% on it even before I fixed that, so I'm pretty sure I did well regardless!)


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